Tag: Orlando short sale expert

Orlando Real Estate remains strong, despite a dip in prices at the end of summer

Posted on by Jenny Zamora

 

Summer’s gone and Orlando Real estate takes a drop

Prices of Orlando real estate dropped slightly last month for the first in a year. Don’t panic Orlando homeowners, this happens every year at this time. The reason for the drop is mostly due to the end of the peak of the summer buying season. Two facts remain true, Orlando real estate inventory is low and demand for great Orlando properties remains high. As long as these factors remain a part of the Orlando real estate market, sellers will be able to get top dollar for their Orlando Home.

Other factors indicating a strong Orlando Real Estate market

Orlando homes are selling faster and for more than they did a year ago. Studies show that Orlando homes are spending less than 80 days on the market before coming under contract and selling for almost  97% of the listing price. A year ago, Orlando Realty was selling for less than 95% of the listing price, and these properties were listed on the MLS for over 100 days.

Great mortgage interest rates are still being offered by lenders. The average interest rate currently being offered for Orlando home buyers is at 3.78 percent as opposed to a year ago when homebuyers paid an average interest rate of 4.26 percent. This is a huge incentive right now for potential Orlando home buyers and anyone interested in buying real estate in Orlando should definitely take advantage of these historically low-interest rates.

There are more regular listings in the Orlando real estate market than has been in years. Although Orlando’s short sales and REO’s still rule Orlando’s real estate inventory right now, there is another quieter group that is not desperate to sell their Orlando properties.  Believe it or not, everyone one in three homeowners owns their house “free and clear”. This group as well as homeowners with very small mortgages on their home are able to ask for top dollar on their Orlando home and they don’t care if it sells or not. Their way of thinking is “I will sell for the right price and if not then I’m not selling”. I’ve had several clients like this over the years, and homeowners like these actually help to maintain property values up in their neighborhoods because their listing prices remain high and they really don’t care how long it takes to sell.

Right now is  a great tome to sell your Orlando Home

Considering all the factors in play right now with Orlando Real Estate, it’s a great time to sell your home. Whether you need an Orlando short Sale done or you’re o of the few and fortunate people that own your property Free and Clear. If you’re interested in seeing how much your Orlando property will sell… click on “How much is my Orlando property worth?” or you can come and see me for a free consultation and I would be happy to sit and talk with you.

Realtor in Orlando, FL

Let's Keep In Touch!

New ORC Form Lead

"*" indicates required fields

Fannie Mae Making great Strides in the Orlando Short Sale Process

Posted on by Jenny Zamora

Fannie Mae is taking the Lead on making short sales move even faster for Orlando homeowners

It’s amazing to see how far certain lenders have come in the way of helping homeowners to get their Orlando short sales approved. In the not-so-distant past, some of the major lenders were hell bent on making the short sale process a nightmare for not only the homeowners but also, the short sale realtors that had to work the entire process. Then even after you’ve submitted the complete package to the lender dotting every I and crossing every t, you would then have to re-submit the entire short sale package several times over either because it needed to be updated or the lender had lost it or claimed to have never received it. I know this may sound absurd to some of you but believe it or not, this used to happen on just about every single file at least once or twice.

It’s only been in the last year or so that we’ve seen a drastic change in the way that lenders handle Orlando short sales in General. There are systems in place such as HudHomes.Gov that some lenders use which make short sales move along a lot faster. And with systems like these in place, no longer can negotiators claim to have never received certain documents or that they’ve lost them. It’s as easy as logging into your account and uploading every page that they request. This was just one of the steps which began to streamline the short sale process.

Since then, there have been laws implemented by congress which require lenders to respond within 60 days of a short sale offer being presented, this was Huge! Even bigger, was when Lenders started giving homeowners large “Cash for Keys” incentives to complete short sales. Not only were homeowners able to get their debt forgiven, but they were able to receive enough cash at closing to start over in a new life.

Most recently, Fannie has come out with new guidelines for loan servicers to follow.  The new guidelines are a part of the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s Servicing Alignment Initiative. The idea is to prevent more foreclosures and help neighborhoods to stabilize.

Fannie Mae’s new guideline changes

• Hardships. Servicers will now be permitted to approve a short sale for borrowers who have certain kinds of hardships but are still current on their loans. Also, in order to reduce paperwork, no documentation of hardship will be required for borrowers who are 90 days or more delinquent and have a credit score lower than 620.

• 2nd-lien payments limited to $6,000. Before, 2nd lien holders often attempted to negotiate higher payments. The loan servicer will be able to offer the maximum payment of $6,000 in order to facilitate the transaction. By setting a standard payout amount and a limit for every transaction, Fannie Mae is removing the guesswork in order to accelerate the short sale process.

• Servicers will have more authority to approve and complete short sales. All servicers will have the authority to approve and complete short sales that conform to the requirements without receiving individual approval from Fannie Mae. Sometimes this part of the process added several months to short sale negotiations.

Jenny Zamora Lic RE Broker, Orlando

Sell A house in Orlando

Let's Keep In Touch!

New ORC Form Lead

"*" indicates required fields

What Exactly is a “Charge Off” when it comes to Orlando Short Sales?

Posted on by Jenny Zamora

A “charge off” is not the same as debt forgiveness

In the world of Orlando real estate when you hear the words “charge off” coming from your lender, it basically means that they are throwing their hands up and giving up on collecting that particular debt, the debt that’s being charged off is also known as a “write off”.  It’s an internal accounting technique that companies use to balance their books by writing off the debt as uncollectible. When you’re working with short sales you hear this term quite often.

This is the part where it can get a little confusing. For example, a “HELOC” or “home equity line of credit” is a  second mortgage secured by your house in which the lender that gave you the “HELOC” thought it was a sound investment for them at the time. The term “charge off” in this case just means that the bank is no longer continuing to bug you with annoying phone calls and letters and they will take a charge off on their books.

However, this doesn’t mean that it ends there. Most of the time the lender will sell the bad debt for pennies on the dollar to a much more aggressive debt collector. If you thought the original bank was annoying, these companies are often 10 times worse. I’ve gotten reports from some of my clients about these companies calling at least once or twice a day, every day including weekends. I consider these companies to be in the same category as telemarketers.

There are only 3 ways to get mortgage debt collectors off your back

1- Bankruptcy 7 or 13

Bankruptcy Chapter 7 and 13. I’m not an attorney and I’m not about to go in-depth on the subject of Bankruptcy laws but in a nutshell, If you file for chapter 7 BK, you are pretty much surrendering all of your assets to the BK court with the exception of your homestead property as well as a vehicle as long as neither of them holds significant equity. This type of BK will end any pending lawsuits as well as any repossession debts.

Chapter 13 bankruptcy enables individuals with regular income to develop a plan to repay all or part of their debts. Under this chapter, debtors propose a repayment plan to make installments to creditors over three to five years. By filing under this chapter, individuals can stop foreclosure proceedings and may cure delinquent mortgage payments over time.

2- Loan modification

Loan modifications make sense when you are able to get the lender to not only adjust your payments but to reduce the principal balance of the loan. It just doesn’t make sense to me to agree to a loan mod if the terms only benefit the lender. Don’t get me wrong, for some people it works out, but in my experience lenders almost always try to design loan mods in a way that benefits them thus setting up the homeowner for failure…and the beat goes on.  Read the fine print!

3- Orlando Short Sale

Now, this is a subject that I am very qualified to talk to you about. Orlando short sales are the preferred method for most people to eliminate their underwater mortgage problem. Orlando homeowners usually come to me after they consult with a Bankruptcy attorney realizing that a short sale is by far their best option. By completing an Orlando short sale on their home, a homeowner is able to rid themselves of their largest debt by far,.. their mortgage. On top of that, homeowners are able to come away with cash from the closing of the transaction, sometimes up to $30,000.00. [not a typo] thirty thousand U.S. dollars.

A short sale also is the lender’s preferred alternative to foreclosure and is often the best option for everyone involved. The only people that don’t care for short sales are Bankruptcy attorneys because there’s no money in it for them.

Let's Keep In Touch!

New ORC Form Lead

"*" indicates required fields

Orlando Real Estate, one of the Nations Highest in Asking Prices, but we won’t be Fooled Again!

Posted on by Jenny Zamora

 Orlando Real Estate is Hotter than ever right now

As of a year ago in August asking prices are up 8.6% which means that we are actually eighth in the nation, tied with San Jose California. This is good news for Orlando homeowners who elected to ride the storm out since the crash in 2007. These homeowners who have been wanting to sell their Orlando property but didn’t want to take a huge loss are now able to sell and even make a profit depending on how much they owe.

Orlando real estate Experts can speculate all they want to and try and predict what the future of Orlando real estate will be, but the fact is that only time will tell. One thing that I always try to advise my clients about is to be very careful when buying Orlando Real estate, especially as an investment. Sure, buying Orlando realty as an investment can be a great idea if you buy it right and don’t let your emotions cloud you’re thinking.

Homebuyers should never depend on Orlando Real estate appreciating when making their decision to buy. This is where a whole lot of people got into a whole lot f trouble in past years. In 2006 people went into a frenzy buying up houses and condos in new construction properties in Orlando with an “I can’t go wrong attitude” thinking that they were going to make a killing. And the fact is that many investors did make a killing doing just that. But there were many more people that lost everything and have never recovered. I know this because working as Orlando Short Sale specialist, most of my clients are short sale clients. I’ve had clients that have had 20 and 30 properties and they now have  20 and 3o properties in default and upside down.

Orlando home buyers should never forget what happened in 2007

As hot as the Orlando real estate market is today, I really hope that people don’t fall into that trance again where they believe that Orlando home prices will only rise and can never fall, that kind of thinking is what got everyone into trouble in the first place.

If you’re thinking of purchasing a home in Orlando, consult with a proven Orlando Real estate expert so that you can make educated decisions on your approach to the world of Orlando Real estate investing.

Orlando Investment Homes

Let's Keep In Touch!

New ORC Form Lead

"*" indicates required fields

The world of Orlando Short Sales may be coming to a screeching halt

Posted on by Jenny Zamora

What will happen to Orlando short sales if the Mortgage debt relief Act of 2007 is not extended?

Short sales have been very popular since the market crashed in 2007,  mainly because sellers have the benefit of not being taxed for the deficiency between the mortgage amount and the actual payoff. What people worry about now is that the  Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007  is about to come to an end at the end of  2012 and so far we haven’t anything about the government extending it.

What do you think would happen if the law doesn’t get extended? In my opinion, this would be the end of Orlando short sales as we know them.

When you think about it, what incentive would a seller have to do an Orlando short sale if they end up with a massive deficiency when it closes?  That’s right… there would be no incentive. In fact, I think that most people will just end up letting it go to foreclosure. This means that Orlando REO realtors would be busier than ever.

Deep down I truly believe that this law will be extended, it just makes good business sense for everyone involved… sellers buyers, and lenders. Orlando real estate is moving right now and a big part of that is because of the short sale inventory.

If you are considering an Orlando short sale on your house, don’t take a chance on the mortgage debt relief act of 2007 being extended. Consult with an Orlando short sale specialist and find out what your options are now or you might regret it.

Jenny Zamora, Lic RE Broker. Orlando Short Sale Specialist

Orlando short sale expert

Let's Keep In Touch!

New ORC Form Lead

"*" indicates required fields